This 3D Printed Telescope Is Powered by Raspberry Pi

Alasdair Allan is a scientist, author, hacker and tinkerer, who is spending a lot of his time thinking about the Internet of Things. In the past he has mesh networked the Moscone Center, caused a U.S. Senate hearing, and contributed to the detection of what was—at the time—the most distant object yet discovered.

Alasdair Allan is a scientist, author, hacker and tinkerer, who is spending a lot of his time thinking about the Internet of Things. In the past he has mesh networked the Moscone Center, caused a U.S. Senate hearing, and contributed to the detection of what was—at the time—the most distant object yet discovered.

The PiKon project is a low-cost telescope kit using 3D printed components, an off-the-shelf heating duct, some Meccano, and a Raspberry Pi camera with the lens removed.

Earlier this year at Maker Faire UK, we talked to Mark Wrigley about the PiKon telescope, and how he went about building the 3D printed, Raspberry Pi powered, telescope.

Based on the Newtonian design, with a 113mm (approx. 4.5″) primary mirror, the telescope dispenses with the traditional flat secondary mirror, placing the small (25mm×25mm) Raspberry Pi camera board at prime focus.

First light images from the prototype PiKon. The angle of view of the PiKon is about 1/4 degree, about half the size of the moon. Photo by Mark Wrigley

The PiKon telescope is now crowdfunding on Indiegogo, and is roughly three quarters of the way towards its funding target with just a few days still to run on the campaign.

Alasdair Allan is a scientist, author, hacker and tinkerer, who is spending a lot of his time thinking about the Internet of Things. In the past he has mesh networked the Moscone Center, caused a U.S. Senate hearing, and contributed to the detection of what was—at the time—the most distant object yet discovered.

Alasdair Allan is a scientist, author, hacker and tinkerer, who is spending a lot of his time thinking about the Internet of Things. In the past he has mesh networked the Moscone Center, caused a U.S. Senate hearing, and contributed to the detection of what was—at the time—the most distant object yet discovered.